In his 16th year he became a monk at Unheung-sa Temple (雲興寺) on the slopes of Deokyong-san Mountain in Dado District, Naju County, South Jeolla Province, under the Venerable Byeokbong Minseong (碧峰 敏性).

It was most unusual for a Buddhist monk, who as such was assigned the lowest rank in society, together with mudangs (巫堂; shaman) and kisaengs, to be recognized as a poet and thinker in this way by members of the Confucian establishment.

As a monk, Cho-ui was not allowed to enter the city walls of Seoul and had to receive visits from these scholars while living in the temple Cheongnyangsa (淸涼寺) outside the capital’s eastern gate or in a hermitage in the hills to the north.

Samatha, often translated as “calm abiding”, comprised a style of practices promoting concentration, culminating in a tranquil awareness that can be effortlessly sustained for hours on end.

[4] Cho-ui composed a treatise, Seonmun sapyeonmaneo (禪門四辯漫語 Four Defenses and Random Words), to warn monks of a crucial dimension of insight missing from their practice.

In the treatise, Choui criticized the contemporary meditation master Baekpa Geungseon 白坡 亘璇 (1767–1852) who wrote the Seonmun sugyeong (禪文手鏡) Hand Glass of Seon Literature.

In 1830, he published a now lost collection of his own poems with prefaces and postscripts by four leading scholar-administrators in which they show their personal interest in Seon (Zen) practice and the drinking of tea.

From 1840 until 1848, Chusa Kim Jeong-hui was exiled to the southern island of Cheju and during those years, Cho-ui visited him no fewer than five times, once staying for six months, teaching him about tea and Buddhism.